Thursday, May 26, 2011

Amazon began selling hardcover and paperback books in July 1995. Twelve years later in November 2007, Amazon introduced the revolutionary Kindle and began selling Kindle books. By July 2010, Kindle book sales had surpassed hardcover book sales, and six months later, Kindle books overtook paperback books to become the most popular format on Amazon.com. Today, less than four years after introducing Kindle books, Amazon.com customers are now purchasing more Kindle books than all print books - hardcover and paperback - combined.

"Customers are now choosing Kindle books more often than print books. We had high hopes that this would happen eventually, but we never imagined it would happen this quickly - we've been selling print books for 15 years and Kindle books for less than four years," said Jeff Bezos, Founder and CEO, Amazon.com. "In addition, we're excited by the response to Kindle with Special Offers for only $114, which has quickly become the bestselling member of the Kindle family. We continue to receive positive comments from customers on the low $114 price and the money-saving special offers. We're grateful to our customers for continuing to make Kindle the bestselling e-reader in the world and the Kindle Store the most popular e-bookstore in the world."

Recent milestones for Kindle include:

* Since April 1, for every 100 print books Amazon.com has sold, it has sold 105 Kindle books. This includes sales of hardcover and paperback books by Amazon where there is no Kindle edition. Free Kindle books are excluded and if included would make the number even higher.
* So far in 2011, the tremendous growth of Kindle book sales, combined with the continued growth in Amazon's print book sales, have resulted in the fastest year-over-year growth rate for Amazon's U.S. books business, in both units and dollars, in over 10 years. This includes books in all formats, print and digital. Free books are excluded in the calculation of growth rates.
* In the five weeks since its introduction, Kindle with Special Offers for only $114 is already the bestselling member of the Kindle family in the U.S.
* Amazon sold more than 3x as many Kindle books so far in 2011 as it did during the same period in 2010.
* Less than one year after introducing the UK Kindle Store, Amazon.co.uk is now selling more Kindle books than hardcover books, even as hardcover sales continue to grow. Since April 1, Amazon.co.uk customers are purchasing Kindle books over hardcover books at a rate of more than 2 to 1.

Kindle offers the largest selection of the most popular books people want to read. The U.S. Kindle Store now has more than 950,000 books, including New Releases and 109 of 111 New York Times Best Sellers. Over 790,000 of these books are $9.99 or less, including 69 New York Times Best Sellers. Millions of free, out-of-copyright, pre-1923 books are also available to read on Kindle devices. More than 175,000 books have been added to the Kindle Store in just the last 5 months.

All Kindle Books let you "Buy Once, Read Everywhere" - on all generation Kindles, as well as on the largest number of devices and platforms, including iPad, iPod touch, iPhone, Mac, PC, BlackBerry, Windows Phone, Android-based devices, and soon HP TouchPads and BlackBerry PlayBooks. Amazon's Whispersync technology syncs your place across devices, so you can pick up where you left off. With Kindle Worry-Free Archive, books you purchase from the Kindle Store are automatically backed up online in your Kindle library on Amazon, where they can be re-downloaded wirelessly for free, anytime.

Monday, May 16, 2011

PRLog (Press Release) – May 15, 2011 – A high-speed rise to notoriety for author Brandon Messerschmidt seemed likely when readers began calling him "The Stephen King of the 21st century" upon the release of his self-published novel "Said To Contain" early this year. His debut work, "Unholy Advent: Deception Of The Christ" had won him praise amongst a small faction of readers when it became the subject of a fiery campaign mounted by religious groups bent on seeing it banned, but this latest novel promises to bring him into a much more mainstream spotlight.

This second offering, coming to market just two months after his first release, tells the suspenseful tale of a truck driver named Randy Johnston trying to earn an honest living while making his way back home from across the country for a scheduled visit with his young son. What the driver doesn't know when he picks up his load from Oceanside, California, is that his trailer has become the means of transport for something that is not of this world. Strange dreams and run-ins with individuals who seem less than typical along the way clue him in to what's afoot, but the true nature of what's happening doesn't set in until he finds himself being chased by malicious men and women with glowing purple eyes who insist that he and his son will die if he doesn't turn his trailer over to them. On the other hand, a trusted companion he meets along the way claims to serve for a branch of the military charged with returning his payload to the stars. He speaks of apocalyptic events that will befall the whole of the world if these creatures are allowed to take possession of "Polyphemus," the strange cargo trailing behind Johnston's haggard Kenworth tractor.

As the story unfolds, Johnston must weigh the potential costs of fulfilling the wishes of either contingent as his boy is taken captive and held for the ransom of his cooperation. He learns that not all is as it seems as the plot takes several heart-stopping twists and turns, culminating in an intergalactic showdown near the launch pads of Kennedy Space Center.

Award-winning Author Andrea Susan Glass will speak about 'How to turn a book into a business" at San Diego Writers/Editors Guild monthly meeting to be held May 23, 2011.

PRLog (Press Release) – May 15, 2011 – It doesn’t matter if you're self published or traditionally published; being an author is being in business—whether you want to be or not! Few authors glean huge profits from one book or even several. The secret is to turn their book into a business by adding additional products and services, creating a successful profit center.
On Monday, May 23, from 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm, the San Diego Writers/Editors Guild will have their monthly meeting. This month's guest speaker is Andrea Susan Glass, an award-winning ghostwriter and copyeditor of more than 100 books, ebooks, and other information products.
“I meet business owners all the time who tell me they’ve written a book or ebook but don’t know what to do next,” Glass, founder of WritersWay, a ghostwriting and copyediting service. “They either don’t know how to sell their book or they’ve sold some books, but can’t seem to make much money. They thought that one book or ebook would be their cash cow,” says Glass.
More and more small business owners, like healthcare providers, realtors, coaches, consultants, and other service professionals have discovered books and books as a way to share their expertise and create passive income. Yet, most find it difficult to sell or not as profitable as they expected.
An experienced infoproduct expert, Glass shows how to build a product pyramid from one idea—that one book or ebook—and from that build a thriving business. A self help book, for example, can spawn products such as a workbook, an ebook, an audio program, a teleseminar series, and a live workshop, as well as services like coaching and teaching. As authors build a following, they can keep selling additional products beyond their book to the same audience of fans. That’s how they can turn their book into a business—and finally see some profits.
The San Diego Writers/ Editors Guild is a group of writers and editors dedicated to improving their skills and helping others do the same since 1979. Regular monthly meetings are held on the fourth Monday each month. Guests are welcome to attend. A $5 donation is requested. All meetings are held at the County Health Facility located at 3851 Rosecrans Street in the Sports Arena area. For more information, visit www.sdwritersguild.org.

Andrea Susan Glass specializes in writing and editing books on business, marketing, self help, natural health, and spirituality. In 2001, she won the San Diego Book Award for best How-To book and currently serves as a judge in the self help category. She's written several of her own books and ebooks, including All About Hybrid Cars and Your Info-Product Success System (www.InfoProductSuccessSystem.com). Andrea teaches for UCSD online, Cal State San Marcos, and holds teleclasses and webinars on creating infoproducts. She's a member of the San Diego Writers/Editors Guild, San Diego Professional Editors Network, and serves as PR person and newsletter editor for Publishers and Writers of San Diego.

Monday, May 9, 2011

Online PR NewsZipgoods.com announced that they release a mini ebook reader, which is like before models, but with 4.3 inch touch screen.

“ Zipgoods.com see many people like to use Kindle to read although paper books are not read by them, they like novelty gadgets. However, zipgoods.com feel that Kindle is a bit huge considering convenience” Said Joe, the product Manager in Zipgoods.com. “ Based on this consideration, zipgoods.com design and release this mini ebook reader, which is only 4.3 inch touch screen”

With a 4.3 inch touch screen, this eBook Reader is easy to hold, you can put it into your pocket, it is indeed that you can read anywhere and anyplace.

“ Although the screen is 4.3 inch, the body of this device is tiny, zipgoods.com did not cut any of its functions” Said Joe. “ We built in most of book formats in it, such as: TXT, PDF, EPUB, CHM, HTML, PDB AND UMD, to most of people surprise, zipgoods.com also add multi-media functions in it ”

“ We add these functions because we did not want reader feel boring when they are watching TXT formats only, they can listen to music or watch a video after they read” said Joe.
This mini ebook reader is convenient to take, easy to use, and with wholesale price. So learn more you can visit zipgoods.com official website.

Zipgoods (HK) Limited [www.zipgoods.com] is one of the largest global online retailers. It offers products at competitive prices by cutting the middleman and offering products directly to the terminal consumers.

Monday, May 2, 2011

Water for Elephants is a historical novel by Sara Gruen. Gruen originally wrote the novel as part of National Novel Writing Month. The story is told as a series of memories by Jacob Jankowski, a "ninety or ninety-three year-old" man who lives in a nursing home. Jacob is told what to eat and what to do. His life wasn't always like this, however, because Jacob ran away and joined the circus when he was twenty-one. It wasn't a romantic, carefree decision, to be sure. His parents were killed in an auto accident one week before he was to sit for his veterinary medicine exams at Cornell. He buried his parents, learned that they left him nothing because they had mortgaged everything to pay his tuition, returned to school, went to the exams, and didn't write a single word. He walked out without completing the test and wound up on a circus train. The circus he joins, in Depression-era America, is second-rate at best. With Ringling Brothers as the standard, Benzini Brothers is far down the scale and pale by comparison.

Water for Elephants is the story of Jacob's life with this circus. Sara Gruen spares no detail in chronicling the squalid, filthy, brutish circumstances in which he finds himself.

Best-selling author Michael Connelly, whose character-driven literary mysteries have earned him a wide following, breaks from the gate in the over-crowded field of legal thrillers and leaves every other contender from Grisham to Turow in the dust with this tightly plotted, brilliantly paced, impossible-to-put-down novel.

Criminal defense attorney Mickey Haller's father was a legendary lawyer whose clients included gangster Mickey Cohen (in a nice twist, Cohen's gun, given to Dad then bequeathed to his son, plays a key role in the plot). But Dad also passed on an important piece of advice that's especially relevant when Mickey takes the case of a wealthy Los Angeles realtor accused of attempted murder: "The scariest client a lawyer will ever have is an innocent client. Because if you [screw] up and he goes to prison, it'll scar you for life."

Louis Roulet, Mickey's "franchise client" (so-called becaue he's able and willing to pay whatever his defense costs) seems to be the one his father warned him against, as well as being a few rungs higher on the socio-economic ladder than the drug dealers, homeboys, and motorcycle thugs who comprise Mickey's regular case load. But as the holes in Roulet's story tear Mickey's theory of the case to shreds, his thoughts turn more to Jesus Menendez, a former client convicted of a similar crime who's now languishing in San Quentin. Connelly tellingly delineates the code of legal ethics Mickey lives by: "It didn't matter...whether the defendant 'did it' or not. What mattered was the evidence against him--the proof--and if and how it could be neutralized. My job was to bury the proof, to color the proof a shade of gray. Gray was the color of reasonable doubt." But by the time his client goes to trial, Mickey's feeling a few very reasonable doubts of his own.

ina Fey’s new book Bossypants is short, messy, and impossibly funny (an apt description of the comedian herself). From her humble roots growing up in Pennsylvania to her days doing amateur improv in Chicago to her early sketches on Saturday Night Live, Fey gives us a fascinating glimpse behind the curtain of modern comedy with equal doses of wit, candor, and self-deprecation. Some of the funniest chapters feature the differences between male and female comedy writers ("men urinate in cups"), her cruise ship honeymoon ("it’s very Poseidon Adventure"), and advice about breastfeeding ("I had an obligation to my child to pretend to try"). But the chaos of Fey’s life is best detailed when she’s dividing her efforts equally between rehearsing her Sarah Palin impression, trying to get Oprah to appear on 30 Rock, and planning her daughter’s Peter Pan-themed birthday. Bossypants gets to the heart of why Tina Fey remains universally adored: she embodies the hectic, too-many-things-to-juggle lifestyle we all have, but instead of complaining about it, she can just laugh it off.

Inkmesh is an ebook search engine that makes it easier to find free ebooks and compare ebook prices for the Kindle, iPhone, Sony Reader, Nook and others. The search engine's index includes some 30 big ebook sites.